Post-Game:
Five Tips for an Event-Based Social Media Campaign.
Recently
I put together a special program in diversity for a prominent business school
that focused on the general lack of recognition of women in technological
spaces. Though I have been planning diversity events for years now, this one
was different…even special. For the first time I was going to be using social
media to manage, market, and capture an event. Additionally, the content of the
program was going to be about the ways that social media can be utilized
strategically to bring visibility and recognition to women in all
organizations, and even for starting their own. Finally, this was going to be
the first event of any kind at the school that would utilize a full social
media campaign. The legitimacy of social media as a strategic resource for the
administration of the school’s programs would be greatly affected by the
success or failure of this event to meet its performance goals.
Now
that the event is in the past tense I want to blog about my experience. I think
that there are a few lessons that I learned in the process that may be
interesting or useful for others. This blog will be cut into two parts. The
last blog contained a short list of lessons derived from the pre-event planning
and campaign building. This blog will be about the post-event wrap-up.
1. Use Social Media to touch all participants three times.
I
think it is very important to touch all actual and virtual guests three times.
This includes the pre-event blog, the actual event, and at post-event blog and
email. This last touch is very important because by creating a blog post you
are inviting guests and participants to share their thoughts about the event in
a public way. This step will increase event satisfaction since you have created
a channel through which constructive conversation about the event’s content can
be directed. Social media is about creating and maintaining relationships, so
it is harmful to the impression of the event if people are simply left hanging
when the event is over.
2. Create
a centralized website to capture all media convergence.
Most
of the readily available social media strategy advice pushes users to sign up
for several kinds of media channels but few stress the attendant need to create
some hub or portal that will serve as the common connector to all of these
media. Media convergence is a central goal of social media management so it is
important that you tie it all together somewhere. Though your blog could serve
this purpose, I prefer to have a separate, free-standing website. I chose Wix for
my hosting (www.professor20.com) and am really satisfied with the flexibility
of the editor.
3. Utilize
Analytics
for all channels for a comprehensive view.
A
wonderful dimension of social media is the prevalence of analytic data
plug-ins, such as Google Analytics. Attached to a webpage, GA provides data on
the number of unique visitors, avg. time on site, how many pages deep into the
site visitors travel, etc... My Typepad blog account tracks referring websites
and visits over time. And programs like TwitterCounter and Twitalyzer allow you
to track your accounts’ overall behavior and network impact. In fact there are
so many different ways to measure the impact of your event – see “100 Ways to
Measure Social Media,” http://p.ly/aQMk8 - that
you have to have to be clear which channels need to be managed and, therefore,
measured.
4.
Have an eye toward the long tail.
Remember
that the viral effect produced by social media means that your YouTube videos and
blogs will continue to be visited long after the initial spike in interest that
happens right after the event is over. A well-crafted social media campaign
will cast a long shadow. When measuring the success of the event, keep the long
tail in mind. Check back on the statistics periodically. For example, the
number of views you have after six months might be a more important indication
of your social media campaign’s success than statistics gathered after the
first week. Also, come up with creative ways to remind your social media
friends and fans about your blogs and videos.
5. Don’t
forget to Meet-up!
Social
media supports social interaction but it is not a substitute for it. Turn those
“followers” into “friends” by meeting face-to-face.
Next:
Using Social Media in my Business Ethics, Strategy, and Entrepreneurship
course.
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